To whom it may concern:

You've secured your plane seat, started shopping for winter clothes, began bidding painful goodbyes, I suppose.

But why aren't we trying to spend the remaining days together? Why aren't we trying to burn our butts over endless cups of mocha? Why aren't we making promises of meeting up at Starbucks Fifth Avenue next Christmas or wherever our spirits would take us in the future? Why aren't we trying at all?

I didn't realize I've really been dreading your leaving. I didn't realize I'd even feel the intense need to write about it. I didn't even want to write about you, damn it, because a number of them have already done so, and I don't want to be one of them! And I'm not!

Why aren't we doing what best friends-about-to-part-ways usually do?

Why did I let these questions pile up into a mountain of sad why's and when's and what if's?

Come now. Best friends are even better than hot cocoa by the fireplace on winter nights.

Don't go before you've actually left. She and I will be waiting.